Long Skittish Poems

Southern Icarus
by Michael R. Burch

Windborne, lover of heights,
unspooled from the truck’s wildly lurching embrace,
you climb, skittish kite...

What do you know of the world’s despair,
gliding in vast solitariness there,
so that all that remains is to
fall?

Only a...

Read More

Salvation of a Formalist, an Ode to Entropy
by Michael R. Burch

Entropy?
God's universal decree
That I get to be
Disorderly?
Suddenly
My erstwhile boxed-in verse is free?
Wheeeeee!



Eternal Currents
by Michael R. Burch

How can I write and not be true
to the rhythm...

Read More

Rejection Slips

With over 5,700 publications if I count poems that have gone viral, I suppose I shouldn’t complain … but I do have some poems that have never been accepted for publication. Here are a...

Read More

Poems about Flight, Flying, and Birds (I)



Flight
by Michael R. Burch

It is the nature of loveliness to vanish
as hummingbird wings, batting against nothingness
seek transcendence...



Southern Icarus
by Michael R. Burch

Windborne, lover of heights,
unspooled from the truck’s wildly lurching...

Read More

A born lioness my untamed heart? ha! 
a mouse, this pulsing token ruled by unruly wants
at times given, traded or stolen - sometimes
thrown down on a dare to be won or lost 
till it became...

Read More

The Spaniel

A Spaniel that uses its head 
Can tell when its owner’s unfed 
So instead of a duck
That is down on its luck 
Will deliver a pizza instead
 
The Afghan Hound

The Afghan’s a dog groomer’s...

Read More

The Bell in the Bush

Down woodland paths the wolf did roam
Far away from his packs home
For game he’d wandered off to seek
The sick, the helpless and the weak
When happened he across a fawn
Tied amid, a...

Read More

“Just when he thought he’d had all he could take,
April arrived like a careless mistake.” 

From DRIVING DIXIE DOWN by Anonymous Brown
Smithstonian Folkways Recordings catalogue # 317-704-1106

When something is broken, it’s no longer of any...

Read More

We have gone to the Kruger Park, and are now back,
All roads there are paved,
But for adventure, you can drive along very doable
Sand roads, the crocodile river runs parallel to
These sand roads and if you...

Read More

Fear and violence and guilty judgment
display synaptically sharp,
competing "Loser!" skittish economies.
Love and active peace sustain buoyance,
resilience,
robustly revolving away
from red skies of mourning;
cooperatively mutual Win-Win
ecology of evolution.

I want so badly to fly my competing belief kites,
and...

Read More

I was in the dumps; but as of right this instant, I'm flabbergasted by my brother's random actions and my weird interactions to be exact...great - messages have stimulated my phone...

Zzzzzzz the buzz was coming...

Read More

Coloring smiling faces donned with faux missing teeth,
and waxing poetic lip schtick adorned with moustaches

Swarthy, spooky, scary carved
pumpkin faces thickly materialized 
out of thin air
as Halloween holiday loomed near
yes... just an innocently naive fickle kid,
who...

Read More

Southern Icarus
by Michael R. Burch

Windborne, lover of heights,
unspooled from the truck’s wildly lurching embrace
you climb, skittish kite ...

What do you know of the world’s despair,
gliding in vast solitariness there
so that all that remains is to

fall?

Only...

Read More

Light, the kind that brings the faintest glimmer of hope,
appeared suddenly through a darkened wood;
like an oasis after travelling through the Sahara so parched
with thirst threatening to take my life for good.

Though death’s bony palm...

Read More

In only a moment of maritime mirth
My ship's maiden voyage was missing at birth
The King's Royal Navy reduced me in rank
By flushing my ship in the place where it sank

I fell in the sea with...

Read More

I am homeward bound
Lusty thoughts, for the love I miss
It’s a surprise, I am coming ‘round
I’m expected two days beyond this
Being away, day after day, left a hole
Being away, hollowed my soul
I rush towards your...

Read More

The Doberman Pinscher

A Doberman’s known to be picky
With friends so to greet one is tricky
To kiss is a bummer
Undoubtedly dumber
Is to sneak up and give one a hickey

The English Setter

The reason we call them a...

Read More

I was moving down an access trail
in my favorite Pennsylvania game land,
heading towards and open meadow,
near which I’d set up a tree stand.

Then came a rustling from some bushes thick,
a buck shot out at lightning...

Read More

Just a stray
                                ...

Read More

It's because of the bacon.

Yeah, it looks good on the menu, sitting there at the rim of the plate. Glistening. Archetypally ridged and ruffled. Positioned perfectly next to the eggs over easy, the pancakes, buxom...

Read More

For those avid crossword groupies of which I are one,
I'm offering free of charge vital data to add to your fun.

So you're stuck on 15-down for the name of a barren of mules!
Groups of creatures...

Read More

Amid Arcady's sylvan groves(where once I gazed
Upon such luminous  and alabaster grace
By her  immortal beauty raptly drawn and dazed
As she turned and  gently upraised   her elfin face.
Like Aphrodite  from...

Read More

I like cute dogs, poofy dogs, goofy dogs,

Wiggly Giggly Barking dogs, quiet dogs too,

Smart dogs, silly dogs, crazy dogs, lazy dogs,

Large agressive guarding dogs,

Those are just a few,

I enjoy helpful dogs, playful dogs, bashful dogs,

Hyperactive...

Read More

Sweet September, see how splendidly she shines!
Subtlety submitting seasonal splendour, she
swamps summer’s splendiferous sights,
by stealthily shrouding splendid scenery, 
with suffused sensuous, sybaritic, scenarios!
Sublimely serene, she spatters and splashes
slivers of saffron, sepia and sienna shades,
slapdash over...

Read More

Do you want?
NO!
A puppy?
YES!
Do you want to
NO!
Go to your friend Susan's?
Yes, I guess I do.
Do you want 
NO
Living with me is really fun.
You can ask your husband.
He calls me his 9-year-old boy.
My first answer is...

Read More